“The spirits are hindering my sleep these days, so I gave in and came into the shop.” She waved her up. “You’re early too, so come up and have a cup of coffee with me. And bring that little mutt with you.”
Rarity smiled and headed left to the next storefront. She had to pull on Killer’s leash to get him to understand they weren’t going into the shop. She sat on a chair, and Killer went to drink out of the water bowl Madame Zelda kept on the porch for the dogs of sightseeing tourists.
“How is everything going? Did you have a lot of business last weekend?” Rarity took the cup of coffee her neighbor had poured from her carafe. “Thanks.”
“No problem. I felt like I was going to have a visitor this morning, so I set up the coffee service for two. And filled up that water dish. I’m glad you were able to stop and chat.” Madame Zelda leaned back in her chair. “Last weekend was busy. Lots of visitors, but I kept seeing the same man. Dark hair, tanned, and I think his eyes were blue. Drew Anderson took his description, but I think he’s forgotten about him. I feel like this guy might solve at least one of your questions.”
“My questions?” Rarity wondered if she’d seen Bret Black. Or maybe the guy from the tent late Friday afternoon. He met that description.
Madame Zelda started shuffling her tarot cards. Back and forth. She smiled as Rarity watched her. “Sorry, it’s habit. It calms me and helps me think. I know he was watching your store, but I’m not sure why.But this was before that poor man was killed, so what could he have been watching for? Can I offer you a reading? At no cost, of course.”
The change of subject threw Rarity a bit, but she nodded. “That would be nice.”
The fortune-teller held out the cards she’d been shuffling. “Maybe this will calm us both down. Cut the deck, please.”
Rarity did as she was told, then Madame Zelda mixed the cards a few more times. She pulled her first card.
“The Fool. Start of a new journey. This is in the past position, so it might relate to your life reinvention when you moved here a few years ago. You started over, changing your career, your home, and your family. I’m so glad you chose Sedona, as are the spirits.”
Rarity nodded. “I am too. I did start completely over and it has paid off. I didn’t know anything about running a bookstore. I’ve got a cute house with a pool and room for my new dog. And a bunch of friends who feel like family. The cards are one hundred percent right, so far.”
“That’s right, you’re a skeptic. Anyway, here’s the second card, for the present, the Star. The card of hope and healing. It’s very positive. Your relationships are healing as well as your body. Your love life is moving from one of pain to a new beginning, especially next to the Fool. Success is yours if you just believe in yourself. Is that ringing any bells?”
“Maybe.” Rarity didn’t want to go into the fact that Kevin had dumped her and now Archer seemed to be the perfect boyfriend. The perfect fit. If she’d believe in herself, and them. She gathered her things. “I should go open the bookstore.”
“Hold on a few minutes. There’s one more card in the reading. I know you don’t want to talk about your personal life, and I get that. So we’ll just say that the Star is a wonderful card to have come up in any situation.”
She turned the next card. The Death card grinned up at her. “Oh, my. Not what I was expecting.”
“That looks bad.” Now Rarity wished she’d never sat down. This is what happened when you let woo-woo into your life. It took a life of its own and tried to scare you.
“Not necessarily. It may or may not mean a physical death. Or it may be talking about the body that they took out of your shop. But if that was true, it should have come earlier in the reading. Maybe the death of a situation. Something is going to change with you and a friendship. I can study the cards more. I wouldn’t worry, though, the other two cards are too hopeful for this one to mean an actual death.”
Rarity thought about Madame Zelda’s reading most of the morning. Had the cards been warning her of a change or of an actual death? Feeling silly, she sighed a breath of relief when Shirley and Darby arrived for their shifts.
“I went over and picked this one up for work. She was going to walk from her house. Can you believe it? What part of dangerous stalker do you not get, Darby?” Shirley rattled on about the morning and what Katie had decided to do with the kids who would overrun the shop on Saturday morning.
“Oh, guess who called and bailed on dinner tonight? I guess I’m happy I wasn’t sitting there waiting for her,” Darby said as she headed to the back room. “Is there coffee?”
“I can’t believe she didn’t do something with the movies. We probably could have asked someone from the film festival to come and talk about how movies are made. We should think about monthly themes around the book clubs based on the events we’re hosting or the festivals in town that month.” Shirley snapped her fingers in front of Rarity’s face. “Are you awake?”
“Sorry, I couldn’t sleep last night,” Rarity said. It wasn’t quite a lie, even though she’d been thinking about Madame Zelda’s reading, not zoning out. “Shirley? Do you believe in the other side? The spirits and the crystals and the vortex stories?”
“You mean the magic surrounding Sedona?” Shirley settled on a chair at Jonathon’s usual table, even though he hadn’t shown up yet. “Well, you’re going to be surprised by my answer, but yes. I do believe the veil is thinner here. I believe in God and the stories from the Bible. If he could perform miracles back then, why would I expect anything different in my day-to-day life? Or question powers I don’t understand? If God sends me a rowboat, I’m going to assume that it’s going to flood sooner or later, and I’m going to get in.”
Rarity smiled at her mention of Rarity’s favorite joke where a man drowned after refusing to be saved off his roof by a rowboat, a bigger boat, and finally a helicopter. When the man complained to God at the pearly gates, God told him that he sent all those things to save him, and he rejected them.
So what was the meaning behind Madame Zelda’s third card? And what could she do to make sure a real death didn’t happen? Especially to Darby.
Symbols and signs were easy to pick out. Assigning meaning to them was a lot harder. Especially when they were swirled up in a pretty picture.
“What do we need to do to get ready for tomorrow’s swarm of preteens?” Rarity asked, ready to get out of her head and be busy.
The next few hours were spent getting the club area ready for the group as well as checking out the young readers shelves to make sure they either had the popular books on the latest list or that they’d ordered them.
When Jonathon came in with Romeo and a bag from Carole’s with lunch, they were all ready for a break. Rarity took the sandwich from him and then went back to grab drinks from the fridge. When she came back, everyone was sitting at tables, talking.
She sat next to Jonathon after dropping off bottles of soda and water. “Did you sleep in this morning?”
